Abstract: This paper describes the designs of a first and second
generation autonomous gas monitoring system and the successful
field trial of the final system (2nd generation). Infrared sensing
technology is used to detect and measure the greenhouse gases
methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) at point sources. The
ability to monitor real-time events is further enhanced through the
implementation of both GSM and Bluetooth technologies to
communicate these data in real-time. These systems are robust,
reliable and a necessary tool where the monitoring of gas events in
real-time are needed.
Abstract: This paper investigates experimentally and
analytically the torsion behavior of steel fibered high strength self
compacting concrete beams reinforced by GFRP bars. Steel fibered
high strength self compacting concrete (SFHSSCC) and GFRP bars
became in the recent decades a very important materials in the
structural engineering field. The use of GFRP bars to replace steel
bars has emerged as one of the many techniques put forward to
enhance the corrosion resistance of reinforced concrete structures.
High strength concrete and GFRP bars attract designers and
architects as it allows improving the durability as well as the esthetics
of a construction. One of the trends in SFHSSCC structures is to
provide their ductile behavior and additional goal is to limit
development and propagation of macro-cracks in the body of
SFHSSCC elements. SFHSSCC and GFRP bars are tough, improve
the workability, enhance the corrosion resistance of reinforced
concrete structures, and demonstrate high residual strengths after
appearance of the first crack. Experimental studies were carried out
to select effective fiber contents. Three types of volume fraction from
hooked shape steel fibers are used in this study, the hooked steel
fibers were evaluated in volume fractions ranging between 0.0%,
0.75% and 1.5%. The beams shape is chosen to create the required
forces (i.e. torsion and bending moments simultaneously) on the test
zone. A total of seven beams were tested, classified into three groups.
All beams, have 200cm length, cross section of 10×20cm,
longitudinal bottom reinforcement of 3
Abstract: Methane is the second most important greenhouse gas
(GHG) after carbon dioxide. Amount of methane emission from
energy sector is increasing day by day with various activities. In
present work, various sources of methane emission from upstream,
middle stream and downstream of oil & gas sectors are identified and
categorised as per IPCC-2006 guidelines. Data were collected from
various oil & gas sector like (i) exploration & production of oil & gas
(ii) supply through pipelines (iii) refinery throughput & production
(iv) storage & transportation (v) usage. Methane emission factors for
various categories were determined applying Tier-II and Tier-I
approach using the collected data. Total methane emission from
Indian Oil & Gas sectors was thus estimated for the year 1990 to
2007.
Abstract: Firms have invested heavily in knowledge
management (KM) with the aim to build a knowledge capability and
use it to achieve a competitive advantage. Research has shown,
however, that not all knowledge management projects succeed. Some
studies report that about 84% of knowledge management projects
fail. This paper has integrated studies on the impediments to
knowledge management into a theoretical framework. Based on this
framework, five cases documenting failed KM initiatives were
analysed. The analysis gave us a clear picture about why certain KM
projects fail. The high failure rate of KM can be explained by the
gaps that exist between users and management in terms of KM
perceptions and objectives
Abstract: The paper deals with the comparison study of
harmonic detection methods for a shunt active power filter. The
%THD and the power factor value at the PCC point after
compensation are considered for the comparison. There are three
harmonic detection methods used in the paper that are synchronous
reference frame method, synchronous detection method, and DQ axis
with Fourier method. In addition, the ideal current source is used to
represent the active power filter by assuming an infinitely fast
controller action of the active power filter. The simulation results
show that the DQ axis with Fourier method provides the minimum
%THD after compensation compared with other methods. However,
the power factor value at the PCC point after compensation is slightly
lower than that of synchronous detection method.
Abstract: The aim of the study is to determine the effects of
perceived organizational support on organizational identification. In
accordance with this purpose was applied on 131 family physicians in
Konya. The data obtained by means of the survey method were
analyzed. According to the results of correlation analysis, while
positive relationship between perceived organizational support,
organizational identification and supervisor support was revealed.
Also, with the scope of the research, relationships between these
variables and certain demographic variables were detected.
According to difference analysis results of the research, significant
differences between organizational identification and gender variable
were determined. However, significant differences were not
determined between demographic variables and perceived
organizational support.
Abstract: The result of process of territory-s development is the territory-s state of development (TSoD), which is pointed towards the provision and improvement of people-s life conditions. The authors offer to measure the TSoD according to their own developed model. Using the available statistical data regarding the values of model-s elements, the authors empirically show which element mainly determines the TSoD. The findings of the research showed that the key elements of the TSoD are the “Material welfare of people" and “People-s health". Performing a deeper statistical analysis of correlation between these elements, it turned out that it is not so necessary for a country to be bent on trying to increase the material growth of a territory, because a relatively high index of life expectancy at birth could be ensured also by much more modest material resources. On the other hand, the economical feedback of longer lifespan within countries with lower material performance is also relatively low.
Abstract: Thermal water hammer is a special type of water
hammer which rarely occurs in heat exchangers. In biphasic fluids, if
steam bubbles are surrounded by condensate, regarding lower
condensate temperature than steam, they will suddenly collapse. As a
result, the vacuum caused by an extreme change in volume lead to
movement of the condensates in all directions and their collision the
force produced by this collision leads to a severe stress in the pipe
wall. This phenomenon is a special type of water hammer. According
to fluid mechanics, this phenomenon is a particular type of transient
flows during which abrupt change of fluid leads to sudden pressure
change inside the tube. In this paper, the mechanism of abrupt failure
of 80 tubes of 481 tubes of a methanol heat exchanger is discussed.
Initially, due to excessive temperature differences between heat
transfer fluids and simultaneous failure of 80 tubes, thermal shock
was presupposed as the reason of failure. Deeper investigation on
cross-section of failed tubes showed that failure was, ductile type of
failure, so the first hypothesis was rejected. Further analysis and more
accurate experiments revealed that failure of tubes caused by thermal
water hammer. Finally, the causes of thermal water hammer and
various solutions to avoid such mechanism are discussed.
Abstract: In this paper, mesh-free element free Galerkin (EFG) method is extended to solve two-dimensional potential flow problems. Two ideal fluid flow problems (i.e. flow over a rigid cylinder and flow over a sphere) have been formulated using variational approach. Penalty and Lagrange multiplier techniques have been utilized for the enforcement of essential boundary conditions. Four point Gauss quadrature have been used for the integration on two-dimensional domain (Ω) and nodal integration scheme has been used to enforce the essential boundary conditions on the edges (┌). The results obtained by EFG method are compared with those obtained by finite element method. The effects of scaling and penalty parameters on EFG results have also been discussed in detail.
Abstract: Inthis paper, design and fabrication of vertical
micromirror for optical switching applications of single mode optical
fibers are proposed. The structure of micromirror will be created
from negative photoresist (SU-8) on X-ray lithography using X-ray
from synchrotron light source. The properties of X-ray from
synchrotron light source are high-energy electrons which can
construct materials that have a high aspect ratio. In addition, the
technique of gold coating of reflective material has been used for
change direction of light between two pairs of optical fibers. At a
wavelength of 1310 nm with minimum average loss of 5.305 dB is
obtained.
Abstract: Autoregressive Moving average (ARMA) is a parametric based method of signal representation. It is suitable for problems in which the signal can be modeled by explicit known source functions with a few adjustable parameters. Various methods have been suggested for the coefficients determination among which are Prony, Pade, Autocorrelation, Covariance and most recently, the use of Artificial Neural Network technique. In this paper, the method of using Artificial Neural network (ANN) technique is compared with some known and widely acceptable techniques. The comparisons is entirely based on the value of the coefficients obtained. Result obtained shows that the use of ANN also gives accurate in computing the coefficients of an ARMA system.
Abstract: In this study, an experimental investigation was carried
out to fix CO2 into the electronic arc furnace (EAF) reducing slag from
stainless steelmaking process under wet grinding. The slag was ground
by the vibrating ball mill with the CO2 and pure water. The reaction
behavior was monitored with constant pressure method, and the
change of CO2 volume in the experimental system with grinding time
was measured. It was found that the CO2 absorption occurred as soon
as the grinding started. The CO2 absorption under wet grinding was
significantly larger than that under dry grinding. Generally, the
amount of CO2 absorption increased as the amount of water, the
amount of slag, the diameter of alumina ball and the initial pressure of
CO2 increased. However, the initial absorption rate was scarcely
influenced by the experimental conditions except for the initial CO2
pressure. According to this research, the CO2 reacted with the CaO
inside the slag to form CaCO3.
Abstract: The reservoir of Kowsar dam supply water for
different usages such as aquaculture farms , drinking, agricultural and
industrial usages for some provinces in south of Iran. The Kowsar
dam is located next to the city of Dehdashat in Kohgiluye and
Boyerahmad province in southern Iran. There are some towns and
villages on the Kowsar dam watersheds, which Dehdasht and Choram
are the most important and populated twons in this area, which can to
be sources of pollution for water reservoir of the Kowsar dam . This
study was done to determine of water pollution of the Kowsar dam
reservoir which is one of the most important water resources of
Kohkiloye and Boyerahmad and Bushehr provinces in south-west
Iran. In this study , water samples during 12 months were collected to
examine Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) and Dissolved
Oxygen(DO) as a criterion for evaluation of water pollution of the
reservoir. In summary ,the study has shown Maximum, average and
minimum levels of BOD have observed 25.9 ,9.15 and 2.3 mg/L
respectively and statistical parameters of data such as standard
deviation , variance and skewness have calculated 7.88, 62 and 1.54
respectively. Finally the results were compared with Iranian national
standards. Among the analyzed samples, as the maximum value of
BOD (25.9 mg/L) was observed at the May 2010 , was within the
maximum admissible limits by the Iranian standards.
Abstract: This study aims at investigating the empirical
relationships between risk preference, internet preference, and
internet knowledge which are known as user characteristics, in
addition to perceived risk of the customers on the internet purchase
intention. In order to test the relationships between the variables of
model 174, a questionnaire was collected from the students with
previous online experience. For the purpose of data analysis,
confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation model
(SEM) was used.
Test results show that the perceived risk affects the internet
purchase intention, and increase or decrease of perceived risk
influences the purchase intention when the customer does the internet
shopping. Other factors such as internet preference, knowledge of the
internet, and risk preference affect the internet purchase intention.
Abstract: ORC (Organic Rankine Cycle) has potential of
reducing consumption of fossil fuels and has many favorable
characteristics to exploit low-temperature heat sources. In this work
thermodynamic performance of ORC with regeneration is
comparatively assessed for various working fluids. Special attention is
paid to the effects of system parameters such as the turbine inlet
pressure on the characteristics of the system such as net work
production, heat input, volumetric flow rate per 1 MW of net work and
quality of the working fluid at turbine exit as well as thermal
efficiency. Results show that for a given source the thermal efficiency
generally increases with increasing of the turbine inlet pressure
however has optimal condition for working fluids of low critical
pressure such as iso-pentane or n-pentane.
Abstract: Psoriasis is a widespread skin disease affecting up to 2% population with plaque psoriasis accounting to about 80%. It can be identified as a red lesion and for the higher severity the lesion is usually covered with rough scale. Psoriasis Area Severity Index (PASI) scoring is the gold standard method for measuring psoriasis severity. Scaliness is one of PASI parameter that needs to be quantified in PASI scoring. Surface roughness of lesion can be used as a scaliness feature, since existing scale on lesion surface makes the lesion rougher. The dermatologist usually assesses the severity through their tactile sense, therefore direct contact between doctor and patient is required. The problem is the doctor may not assess the lesion objectively. In this paper, a digital image analysis technique is developed to objectively determine the scaliness of the psoriasis lesion and provide the PASI scaliness score. Psoriasis lesion is modelled by a rough surface. The rough surface is created by superimposing a smooth average (curve) surface with a triangular waveform. For roughness determination, a polynomial surface fitting is used to estimate average surface followed by a subtraction between rough and average surface to give elevation surface (surface deviations). Roughness index is calculated by using average roughness equation to the height map matrix. The roughness algorithm has been tested to 444 lesion models. From roughness validation result, only 6 models can not be accepted (percentage error is greater than 10%). These errors occur due the scanned image quality. Roughness algorithm is validated for roughness measurement on abrasive papers at flat surface. The Pearson-s correlation coefficient of grade value (G) of abrasive paper and Ra is -0.9488, its shows there is a strong relation between G and Ra. The algorithm needs to be improved by surface filtering, especially to overcome a problem with noisy data.
Abstract: Drought is one of the most important natural disasters which is probable to occur in all regions with completely different climates and in addition to causing death. It results in many economic losses and social consequences. For this reason. Studying the effects and losses caused by drought which include limitation or shortage of agricultural and drinking water resources. Decreased rainfall and increased evapotranspiration. Limited plant growth and decreased agricultural products. Especially those of dry-farming. Lower levels of surface and ground waters and increased immigrations. Etc. in the country is statistical period (1988-2007) for six stations in Roudbar town were used for statistical analysis and calculating humid and dry years. The dependable rainfall index (DRI) was the main method used in this research. Results showed that during the said statistical period and also during the years 1996-1998 and 2007. more than half of the stations had faced drought. With consideration of the conducted studies. Drawing diagrams and comparing the available data with those of dry and humid years it was found that drought affected agricultural products (e.g.olive) in a way that during the year 1996 1996 drought. Olive groves of Roudbar suffered the greatest damages. Whereupon about 70% of the crops were lost.
Abstract: To compute dynamic characteristics of nonlinear viscoelastic springs with elastic structures having huge degree-of-freedom, Yamaguchi proposed a new fast numerical method using finite element method [1]-[2]. In this method, restoring forces of the springs are expressed using power series of their elongation. In the expression, nonlinear hysteresis damping is introduced. In this expression, nonlinear complex spring constants are introduced. Finite element for the nonlinear spring having complex coefficients is expressed and is connected to the elastic structures modeled by linear solid finite element. Further, to save computational time, the discrete equations in physical coordinate are transformed into the nonlinear ordinary coupled equations using normal coordinate corresponding to linear natural modes. In this report, the proposed method is applied to simulation for impact responses of a viscoelastic shock absorber with an elastic structure (an S-shaped structure) by colliding with a concentrated mass. The concentrated mass has initial velocities and collides with the shock absorber. Accelerations of the elastic structure and the concentrated mass are measured using Levitation Mass Method proposed by Fujii [3]. The calculated accelerations from the proposed FEM, corresponds to the experimental ones. Moreover, using this method, we also investigate dynamic errors of the S-shaped force transducer due to elastic mode in the S-shaped structure.
Abstract: The proper selection of the AC-side passive filter
interconnecting the voltage source converter to the power supply is
essential to obtain satisfactory performances of an active power filter
system. The use of the LCL-type filter has the advantage of
eliminating the high frequency switching harmonics in the current
injected into the power supply. This paper is mainly focused on
analyzing the influence of the interface filter parameters on the active
filtering performances. Some design aspects are pointed out. Thus,
the design of the AC interface filter starts from transfer functions by
imposing the filter performance which refers to the significant current
attenuation of the switching harmonics without affecting the
harmonics to be compensated. A Matlab/Simulink model of the entire
active filtering system including a concrete nonlinear load has been
developed to examine the system performances. It is shown that a
gamma LC filter could accomplish the attenuation requirement of the
current provided by converter. Moreover, the existence of an optimal
value of the grid-side inductance which minimizes the total harmonic
distortion factor of the power supply current is pointed out.
Nevertheless, a small converter-side inductance and a damping
resistance in series with the filter capacitance are absolutely needed
in order to keep the ripple and oscillations of the current at the
converter side within acceptable limits. The effect of change in the
LCL-filter parameters is evaluated. It is concluded that good active
filtering performances can be achieved with small values of the
capacitance and converter-side inductance.
Abstract: The basis of this paper is the assumption, that graviton
is a measurable entity of molecular gravitational acceleration and this
is not a hypothetical entity. The adoption of this assumption as an
axiom is tantamount to fully opening the previously locked door to
the boundary theory between laminar and turbulent flows. It leads to
the theorem, that the division of flows of Newtonian (viscous) fluids
into laminar and turbulent is true only, if the fluid is influenced by a
powerful, external force field. The mathematical interpretation of this
theorem, presented in this paper shows, that the boundary between
laminar and turbulent flow can be determined theoretically. This is a
novelty, because thus far the said boundary was determined
empirically only and the reasons for its existence were unknown.